The Institution of Marriage
by Loveedith
Summary: What Michael Gregson thinks when he reads Lady Edith's Letter to the Times. Follows the development between Edith and Gregson in series 3 plus Christmas special. No AU
1. A letter to the Times

Edith Crawley. He had recognised the name immediately, when he saw her article in the morning paper. Lady Edith Crawley. He was almost sure it was her, but he would check it later. First he must read her article, if it was any good. But he was quite sure it was, since she had managed to get it published in The Times.

The article was even better than he had expected, both the writing and the argumentation. Witty, even a little funny. The woman who had written this would be perfect for a column in The Sketch. If she was perfect for the other thing he had in mind for her, he didn't know yet, maybe she was terribly ugly.

He went to the cabinet with clippings and brought out the folder of the Crawleys. There was the pictures and articles of Lady Mary's wedding to the future Earl of Grantham. And then there was that little news-item, yes, Lady Edith Crawley, he had remembered it right!

'The marriage between Sir Anthony Strallan of Locksley and Lady Edith Crawley, the daughter of Robert and Cora Crawley, The Earl and Countess of Grantham, that was planned to take place yesterday, was called off in the last minute by the groom. No new date is set for the ceremony.'

She had been jilted at the altar! With any luck she would be quite vulnerable after a thing like that!

Well, if he wanted to have a chance to seduce her, he couldn't let her know that he knew she had been jilted. So he crumpled the clipping and threw it into the fireplace in the back office. If she came to work here she was bound to look up her own family among the clippings. And maybe his as well, he thought, and took out the old clippings from his own wedding from their folder and let the fire take them as well.

Maybe he was unnecessarily careful, he wasn't even sure that he would find this woman attractive at all. But since she was such a good writer, there was really no risk in offering her a job. If he found out that she was unattractive he would just keep his hands off her. In this case, he could only win.

Besides, if _he_ remembered she had been jilted, the readership might do so as well, and that would add some extra spice when they read her articles.

So he sat down to write her a letter with an offer to write a column in The Sketch.

...

AN: I think that there is no way that Gregson, as a newspaper man, could not have heard of Edith's jilting.


	2. No answer

Michael Gregson had expected to hear from Lady Edith Crawley very soon. He had expected to get a quick answer to his letter, he was sure she would be flattered by his offer, but nothing happened. It was really frustrating, every time the post came he leafed through the bundle of letters in search of one written by her, but it didn't come. Maybe some other paper had picked her up - maybe the Times had made her an offer. But he never saw any articles by her hand in any of the other papers, so he guessed she just hadn't been able to think about things like that after her sister's death.

After more than a month had gone by without any answer, he wrote her a new letter. He renewed his offer, and asked if she was ever in London, so he could meet her. He tried not to sound too eager, but hold it all in a businesslike tone. He would like a chance to see what she looked like, but he knew he usually wasn't too fussy. He had slept with most of the women working at the Sketch, and they hadn't all been great beauties.

And he had only made the mistake of marrying one of them, but boy was that a mistake! His wife had found out about one of his other women and made a big, embarrassing scene about it. He had managed to stop her from asking for a divorce, with him as the guilty party, but only by giving her a small country house and threatening to take their daughter away from her if she insisted. He had managed to silence her there for a couple of years, but he wouldn't like to give her the satisfaction of a divorce. Partly because he thought she was making a mountain out of a molehill, partly because the Sketch was read mainly by women. They were bound to side with the wife in a case like this, and possibly end their subscriptions.

But his wife had stayed in the countryside, she never came to London and he never mentioned her at work. He never went to see her either, he was quite tired of her and not very interested in the child. So it was very unlikely that Lady Edith Crawley would ever hear of them.

...

AN: Thank you for reading!

I think Gregson's whole story about the mad wife was just so much crap to make Edith feel sorry for him.


	3. An Answer

His second letter had worked perfectly.

He got a quick answer where she said that she was coming to London soon, so he wrote back inviting her to see the office and have tea with him.

When he showed her around the office, she was very eager and interested . And she was not a bad looker either, although she wasn't a breathtaking beauty like her sister. But maybe that was as well, she wouldn't be all that used to compliments. Sometimes he thought he was laying it on too thick when he complimented all those plain or almost plain women. But it seemed they wanted to hear things like that, and wanted to believe what they heard, so why not?

He wondered why that Strallan-fellow had dumped her like that. First taking the trouble to ask her to marry him and then change his mind in the last minute, after all the preparations were made. But on the other hand, with his own bad experience of marriage, he could kind of sympathise with the man. It was always important not to let a woman get the better of you.

He was meeting her for lunch the next day and he was almost sure she would accept to write for The Sketch. Which would give him the opportunity to see her again. Everything went well, so far so good!

As he sat there at the table at Rules he felt quite pleased with himself. He was beginning to feel the thrill of the chase. With any luck she would be at least a little bit late so he could say that he was afraid she had stood him up. To show his own vulnerability, so to speak.

After that he could talk about her sister's wedding, and then tell her he was glad she wasn't married. To make her believe he might want to marry her. That usually went down well with women.

All that went according to plan. The only surprising thing was that she told him about her jilting, she was obviously stronger than he had expected. But it all went well in the end, although he had to improvise a bit. The important part was after all that she accepted his offer, which she did.

This would be interesting.

...

AN: Thank you for reading and reviewing.

There might only be one more chapter to this story. I might not like what happens in the CS, and I have tried so far not to make this story AU.


	4. The Mad Wife

Afterwards he wondered where he had got that idea.

The mad wife? Wasn't that from some old novel? He didn't remember the details, but it must be. Maybe Jane Austen or someone like that. He didn't really fancy those old novels by women. Too much romantic nonsense.

This Edith Crawley business was getting to be a little too much work. But since he had never slept with an Earl's daughter before, maybe it was worth it. Or would be worth it.

It had started out so well when she came to discuss her article about the wounded soldiers. He was able to give her a compliment, and thought he had her spinning like a cat after that. Next time he was going to put in the heavy artillery, he had thought.

But then she came back, just a few days later, angry and irritating, even wanting to hand in her resignation. Somehow she had found out about his marriage. He had to think fast, so he had got this crazy idea about the mad wife. Luckily he knew about the divorce-laws. He had written an article for the Sketch some time ago about a woman with this kind of predicament, a woman with a mad husband.

And Lady Edith was clever, but not all that clever. She swallowed the bait, even felt sorry for him. Women always believed what they wanted to believe, according to his experience. So it was still all going according to plan!

And it was such a sweet revenge on his wife to call her a lunatic! It got him smiling from ear to ear!

He knew now this Edith Crawley business would work out well. And come to think about it, it was even better like this. He wouldn't have to make up an excuse not to marry her any longer.

Everything was perfect in a perfect world!

..

AN: I am finished with this now. Tired of Gregson.

And Gregson has got the book and the author wrong. (As most English people are bound to know.)

Thank you for reading and reviewing!


	5. Scotland

He just couldn't believe it. He had kept this Edith Crawley thing going for more than a year, without any result whatsoever.

Luckily he had had quite a few other affairs in the meantime, otherwise he wouldn't have known what to do.

He had started saying he loved her just after she had found out about his marriage. But even that hadn't helped. A 28-year old virgin, one would have expected her to be thankful to get rid of that! She must have had a strange upbringing. She was terribly polite, and friendly, but that was all. And writing very good articles. So maybe he should just give up on that other thing.

But first one last try.

So he decided to go to Scotland. To try to get to know her family. Tell _them_ that he loved her. Might do the trick.

He had got on the good side of Matthew Crawley by pretending he had been in the war. Since he knew all about Matthew's story, it was an easy guess that the war was a good way to go. And he had read enough about the war to sound genuine. It was as easy to deceive men as women , he knew.

When Matthew Crawley started to question him he panicked. He didn't know how much Edith had told him, so he brought out the same story about the mad wife as he had told Edith. He regretted it afterwards, he hadn't expected the man to ask him to end it with Edith. And he had thought Matthew had known part of it already.

But now he had to pretend to end it with Edith during that dance, or Matthew would tell her parents.

It turned out to be his best idea yet. It almost sounded like she was ready to go to bed with him. Finally!

And no one except Edith and Matthew knew that he was married. So it almost came as a relief when he heard that Matthew had died in a car-crash. He was sorry for the chap, of course, he had been nice enough, but still. It would make things easier for him with Edith.

This would be nice!

...

AN: Thank you for reading. Hope this is my last chapter. Still not AU.

I think the actor who plays Gregson does a good job at making him creepy.


End file.
